That Scooter would walk, I had no doubt. I figured that he would be allowed to remain free while the appeals process continued. Never in my wildest imaginings did I dream up this scenario: President Bush, after the judge told Scooter he’d have to cool his heels in jail while his lawyers appealed the verdict, commuted the sentence.

My question to the Republicans is: What happened to your vaunted ‘Rule of law’? You know, the one you used to bludgeon the Democrats with during the Clinton debacle? When we exclaimed that Clinton was being targeted for consensual relations with an intern, you replied that it was the lying not the BJ. He lied about it to a grand jury.

Let’s fast forward to 2007. I. Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby was found guilty in a court of law, of lying to the grand jury and obstructing justice. Where is your respect for the rule of law now?

Eventually the rocket shrapnel was removed from (Spc. Jon) Town’s neck and his ears stopped leaking blood. But his hearing never really recovered, and in many ways, neither has his life. A soldier honored twelve times during his seven years in uniform, Town has spent the last three struggling with deafness, memory failure and depression. By September 2006 he and the Army agreed he was no longer combat-ready.

But instead of sending Town to a medical board and discharging him because of his injuries, doctors at Fort Carson, Colorado, did something strange: They claimed Town’s wounds were actually caused by a “personality disorder.” Town was then booted from the Army and told that under a personality disorder discharge, he would never receive disability or medical benefits.’

—————————————————————————————-

So let me get this straight: We’ve sent our best and brightest to fight in a war that was ill-conceived, for reasons which have turned out to be lies; now when they are no longer of any use to this bloodthirsty administration, they are discharged in such a way that they can’t even get the benefits they are entitled to?

And somehow, with a straight face, this administration can say that they are the only ones who support the troops??? Unbelievable!

I watched the speech with growing unease. I knew that he would ignore the findings of the Iraq Study Group; they told him what he did not want to hear. I knew that he would ignore the Democrats. But to ignore the clear signal that we, the people, wanted fewer– not even more troops in Iraq was astounding.

So there we have it; 21,500 more troops in Iraq, the majority to pacify Baghdad. 4000 to Anbar Province. Does anyone see this as anything other than too little, too late?

It’s beginning to look and feel like window dressing.

What are we getting ready to do, Mr. President? In your speech was a not thinly-veiled enough threat to Iran and Syria. With what troops will we attack sir?

If there was any justice in this world, he and his war-mongering buddies would find themselves trapped in a GI’s body, like a Twilight Zone episode. So they can see what the have done to our troops, some of which are on their third and fourth deployments. So they can taste the fear and boredom, rage and hopelessness that follow the troops like shadows. Maybe, just maybe minds would be changed.